LisaD Posted January 1, 2017 Share Posted January 1, 2017 I have a 3rd grader and a 1st grader. We started out with Getty Dubay Italic and my DS was into Book D and my DS was into Book C. After repeated requests by my DS, I have switched them both to Cursive First for a more simple and traditional cursive and because we use Spell to Write and Read. Obviously, we did printing first. So far, we have followed the directions and done all the steps (saying the strokes out loud, doing it with our finger- in the air, on the card and in salt, writing it with a dry erase marker and finally writing it on paper) with the beginning strokes and letter a. However, we are all finding it boring and tedious. My DS keeps chomping at the bit to just get to the writing. He would be fine to do that- he has very neat writing and attention to detail. My DD (6) has a harder time with neatness although her motor skills are fine, so she would benefit from more, I think. The only reason I hesitate to skip any steps in the process is because I want them to know the how-to inside out, not just copy. But, at the rate we are going, we'll never finish because it's the first to get dropped when we get busy since we all find it to be drawn out. Do any of you who use Cursive First NOT do all the steps and just say the strokes and write it? How well did that work for you in the long term? Any other suggestions? I would like both of them to work thru cursive by the end of this year (and they want to also!). Help! Thanks in advance! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Schadenfreude Posted January 1, 2017 Share Posted January 1, 2017 I have skipped the steps. I just show them how to make it using the correct words and watch them do the first line to make sure they are forming it correctly. They did say the strokes as they wrote for the first practice line. It has worked well in the long run. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RootAnn Posted January 1, 2017 Share Posted January 1, 2017 The very first thing I would do is separate your older & younger child for cursive. The older one is going to pick it up quicker and have more writing stamina than the younger. The second thing is to skip all the steps - maybe just doing one of them each time before writing if you think it will help reinforce. The third thing is to only spend 5-10 minutes total (per kid) on cursive each day. I've done it with all five of my kids & honestly didn't do all those pre-writing steps ever. We did cursive with sidewalk chalk (large motor) outside. We did a lot of running around the clock (again, outside, sidewalk chalk, summertime). Most of mine did writing-in-salt (except we used sugar - yum!) before we did writing-on-paper. A lesson (or two) took roughly five minutes and was easy to fit in just about anytime of day except when they were tired. My oldest is the only one who learned manuscript first. Some kids have better handwriting than others. All write in cursive for their official schoolwork - except for when they type things (eldest). After we go through all the letters (writing in salt/sugar, writing using the handwriting pages), we reinforce with our regular spelling exercises (SWR) everyday (or 4x/week or 3x/week, depending on the age of the kid - up to when we drop spelling). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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